Thank you for your comment. I appreciate that you are concerned about whether or not something will have a negative impact on your child. I have actually forward your question to Tedd Tripp, and I am hoping that he will reply with some additional insight. I encourage you to check out a reply I made to a similar comment on a related page. The link to that post is as follows:

http://blog.stocksohio.com/2009/05/14/ch-11-embracing-biblical-methods-the-rod-shepherding-a-childs-heart-a-synopsis/

In regards to your specific post, I note a couple of things. The first observation is that we serve a good god, and he would not prescribe anything for us or for our kids that is not ultimately in our best interest. Admittedly, sometimes these methods in the hands of fallen human beings are abused leaving negative impacts. That’s why any use of spanking in discipline must be done in the same manner that God disciplines us. Those methods are described throughout the book and this synopsis, so I will not reiterate them here, but needless to say one of the most fundamental criteria for spanking is that a parent should never spank out of anger. Spanking must be done out of love and in the appropriate manner in order to be effective.

Secondly, I am not familiar with Roy Lessin or the individual referenced in your post. I have read the letter, and I feel for the pain of that individual. That said, as I indicate in my prior post, there are no convincing studies that spanking, done properly, leads to sexual issues nor do I expect that it is true (see point #1 above). Furthermore, if the methods of spanking (age, location, shame, forced emotions, etc.) as described in the letter are true, then those methods are clearly unbiblical.

Spanking should be one of the hardest things a parent has to do in raising there kids, and we owe it to our kids to make sure that when we use that form of discipline, as prescribed by God, that we are doing it in a Biblical manner.

I hope this helps. Should I hear a reply from Mr. Tripp, I will be sure to post it here.

God Bless You!

What if spanking harms my child’s sexuality or I notice my child has an unnatural interest or fixation on spanking after I do all this spanking?

This woman, and many others, would like to know:
http://www.nospank.net/fenimore.htm
“One aspect of receiving a Roy Lessin spanking is the sexual aspect. It’s taken me years to even begin to allow myself to speak of this aspect. You see, as a child I had no idea what sex was. I just had this funny sensation that came and went during the Roy Lessin spanking ritual. To my great dismay, I learned that sexual stimulation can be cross-wired with the painful ritual of spankings. This cross-wiring was a real problem for me. Because I couldn’t cope with the double message of love and pain, I avoided developing an intimate relationship with a man for a very long time…”